Wendi C. Thomas: Rocketeer partners fly in face of images

Wooddale seniors Wesley Carter (left) and Darius Hooker exhibit the rocket that qualified them for the finals of the Team America Rocketry Challenge in Washington. Their achievements are an example of what the city schools can produce.

Wooddale seniors Wesley Carter (left) and Darius Hooker exhibit the rocket that qualified them for the finals of the Team America Rocketry Challenge in Washington. Their achievements are an example of what the city schools can produce.

Stan Carroll/The Commercial Appeal

Darius Hooker was down to the last rocket motor.

If this launch didn't go well, there was no hope the Wooddale High senior would qualify for an elite rocket contest.

But it did.

Out in a field at Shelby Farms, the rocket made of balsa wood and a special cardboard tube, soared 802 feet in the air, stayed there for 45 seconds and then parachuted back to Earth.

More importantly, the two raw eggs inside returned intact.

The near-perfect flight catapulted Hooker, 18, into the Team America Rocketry Challenge, but there's another hurdle.

The team needs money to get Darius, who has a 3.8 GPA, and his rocket teammates to Washington for the May 12 competition and back the next day for graduation.

At a team meeting Monday, Darius and Wesley Carter, 17, a senior who also has a 3.8 GPA, seemed confident they and their three underclassmen teams will be able to travel to the contest.

So is volunteer Bill Wood, past president of the local chapter of the National Space Society.

"I don't care if we have to walk, we'll find a way to go," he said.

Wooddale's team is the only one from Tennessee, Mississippi, Arkansas, Louisiana or Georgia in the competition this year.

And best Wood can tell, there aren't many inner-city school teams in the contest that drew thousands of applicants and chose just 100 finalists.

Darius' and Wesley's accomplishments are proof of what can happen when the planets align, when students' drive meets opportunity and resources.

The drive was sparked in 2008, when Darius and Wesley went to a weeklong summer aviation camp.

Bitten by the aeronautics bug, the boys chose to attend Wooddale, which has the area's premier aviation program.

The opportunity came via Wood, who helped start the rocket team after several other schools said no.

"None of the elite schools wanted to take on this challenge," said Wood, who is a part-time Pink Palace planetarium presenter and FedEx hub tour guide.

Wooddale aviation teacher Jeff Holmes is the team's school sponsor, buyer of the eggs and supplier of encouragement.

And it's Gary Cole, a retired CPA and chairman of the Mid-South Rocket Society, who pours his own money into the team, buying motors and tapping his connections to find scarce supplies.

The team has made more than a few omelets, exploded some rockets and left others dangling from trees outside the school, Wesley said, laughing.

The school sits on a flight path, Darius said, so they're careful with the ones that can reach heights of 1,000 feet. No need to draw attention from the FAA.

They remembered one night they stayed up until 6 a.m., trying to perfect a rocket.

Then, Wesley said, "We were new to it. It was actually rocket science."

"My hands were bleeding from cutting the O rings."

But now?

"I've built it so many times, I could build it in my sleep," Darius said.

Wesley's rocket didn't make the competition, but he and Darius tag-team the projects -- Wesley is best at math, Darius excels at physics.

"I give him as much credit as I deserve," Darius said, ever gracious.

Wesley was less modest: "Everyone in the school, they know that when Darius and I get together for a competition, we're going to win."

When they were freshmen, classmates teased them for being nerds and geeks. But since then?

"They call us fly boys," Darius said.

A beaming Freda Williams, whose city school board district includes Wooddale, watched as the boys explained how they use elaborate computer software to tweak the design and do simulated launches.

"People don't know about" these kinds of programs, Williams said, "or they dismiss them as an anomaly."

There is a persistent, noxious narrative about city schools and young men like Darius and Wesley.

It does not include words like altimeter and schematics and private pilot licenses, which both teens are earning.

It would not predict for them careers in air traffic control, the field in which Wesley is already interning, or aeronautic engineering, which will be Darius' concentration at Middle Tennessee State University.

But it should.

"No school is perfect," Darius said, "but there's a lot of good things going on at Wooddale. If you want it, the opportunities are here."

The opportunity, the resources and hopefully, support from Memphians to fly these kids to D.C.

Said Wood: "We have kids who are succeeding where people don't expect them to achieve and Memphis should be proud of that."